


A Cunning Plan

by Motchi



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: F/M, Romantic Comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-18
Updated: 2019-09-18
Packaged: 2020-10-20 21:23:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20682128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Motchi/pseuds/Motchi
Summary: Jareth thinks he’s found a way to Sarah’s heart.





	1. A Cunning Plan

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally a oneshot written ages ago as part of a fic exchange for the labyfic comm on LiveJournal. Once it was cleaned up, it ended up a little longer.

It wasn't perhaps a miracle, but it was definitely a sight.

The Goblin King's castle, which on a normal day towered above the labyrinth like a sour and foul bully, today looked like it'd been wrestled into submission and had its mouth wiped out with soap. Its stone walls had been scrubbed until they shone with colors other than their usual brown and gray. Layers of dust had been swept from floors that hadn't seen a broom in decades. Every rug had been taken outside and given a sound beating, and all the castle windows, newly free of their coatings of grease, had been thrown open to let in fresh air, the sun, and the smell of something other than badly boiled chicken.

Everything spoke of preparation for a tremendous _something. _Even the goblin guards were spit-polished (in most cases: literally) and attempting to stand in formation in the front hall.

Hoggle entered the castle with some trepidation, wondering if he and his shoes, fresh from the dirt paths of the gardens, were welcome in this rehabilitated place. Cleanliness always made him nervous, but that all the current scouring and degreasing might have something to do with his business with Jareth made both him and his shoes more than a lot on edge.

Nevertheless, he had been summoned, and however unsure his shoes might be of the still-damp-from-a-good-soaping carpets, they were more frightened of the King's anger.

They located Jareth on the second floor giving the once-over to a room so frilly it made his eggshell blue frock coat look dull. Every wall and even the mouldings at the ceiling were covered in pale pink paint. The tall windows were framed with pink silk. The lone exception was the rug that covered most of the floor; it was a light cream base, with small, multicolored flowers smattered across it. Everything else—the dress-filled wardrobe in the corner with the delicate scrollwork legs, the vanity with the cherub-framed mirror and brightly colored bottles, the embroidered footstool under one of the windows—was unabashedly, most assuredly...pink.

Scuffling across the threshold, Hoggle had the disconcerting (and slightly horrifying) sensation of entering someone's mouth. His shoes timidly asked him if it was too late to run. As Jareth cut off his examination of the canopied bed in the center of the room to greet the new arrival, a seldom-used smile sat on his face. Hoggle's knees knocked together to see it and his shoes asked him, once again, if they could run.

Jareth's smile quickly faded. "How now," he said, frowning. "Why the ugly face?"

Hoggle put both hands to his cheeks and nose in alarm. They felt the same to him. "Beggin' your pardon, Your Majesty, but I always look like this."

The answer elicited a snort from Jareth. "Good one. Now, seeing how you've troubled yourself to come all this way”—he paused to smooth a ruffle at his neck—"I suppose this is the part where I tell you why I've called you here."

Since he knew nothing about parts, Hoggle shuffled his feet and kept silent.

Jareth stared at Hoggle. "I want your opinion,” he said, stroking his chin. “You're still friends with Sarah, are you not?"

A queasy, dreadful feeling that had nothing to do with the color of the room crawled through Hoggle's bowels. The scrubbed castle, Jareth's sudden interest in him, the confectionery of a room he was standing in... It didn't take a genius—or even a dummy—to figure out what was going on. It all made sense now.

_We should've run when we had the chance,_ his shoes told him.

But it was too late. Clearly Jareth had a plan—a cunning one, judging by all the staring and chin-stroking—and if Hoggle made for it now, he'd surely be caught and Jareth would be even more unpleasant and wrathful. Everybody knew that cunning plans made by powerful men were Not To Be Thwarted. Especially if one of those powerful men happened to possess a long memory _and_ was your boss.

"We're still friends," Hoggle admitted. Above the chin-stroking fingers, the corners of Jareth's mouth bunched upward into an _almost_-smile. A good sign—Hoggle felt _almost_-relieved. Then he felt _almost_-guilty for feeling _almost_-relieved. He hoped Sarah never found out about this.

"Excellent! And do you see her often? Talk to her often?"

"I do," Hoggle answered, but hastily added, "She's a bit busier than she used to be though, now that she's moved to the giant apple. She's got a big job now, a fancy one with lots of responsibility. Ludo and Didymus and me, we just wait until she needs us. Which, uh...isn't very often...any more." He mumbled the last part into his collar, a little saddened by how much that was true.

Jareth nodded anyway, seemingly pleased by the first part at least. "What a fortunate girl our busy Miss Williams is. Any lonely girl in a big, new city would count herself lucky to have such loyal, understanding friends like you. Wouldn't you agree?"

Hoggle drew himself up and said proudly, "I would."

"Superb," Jareth said. The hand at his chin disappeared to join his other hand at the small of his back as he began to pace the area at the foot of the bed. "Now then, is it safe to assume that with this long history of friendship you've become well acquainted with her tastes?"

"I know what she likes well enough."

"Then tell me, how do you think Sarah would feel about"—Jareth spread his hands wide to encompass the gaudy room—"this?"

She'd hate it, absolutely despise it, want to paint it gray and hang up black and white photos all over, Hoggle knew, but if he told Jareth that—well, he might as well pick out his oubliette now. On the other hand, if he lied, without a doubt something unabashedly, most assuredly, pinkishly bad was going to happen to Sarah.

"Hrm. Well, you see..." Hoggle began.

Jareth stopped pacing. "Yes?"

Hoggle tried to shuffle his feet but his shoes, mad at him for not running when they had the chance, were too busy sulking. He ended up almost falling flat on his face. Flustered, he righted himself and stammered, "Um, well, Your Majesty ain't going to like it."

"There are many things I don't like," Jareth replied coolly. "Don't assume this is one of them. Now out with it—what would Sarah think?" The look on his face said he wasn't to be trifled with.

Hoggle silently said good-bye to Didymus and Ludo, then cleared his throat and blurted in one long exhale, "Beggin'YourMajesty'spardonbutSarahwouldn'tlikethisatall." The tips of his shoes were the last things he saw before he pinched his eyes shut. _Traitors!_ he thought, then cowered and waited for the inevitable poof into eternal damnation.

"...What?"

Hoggle cracked an eye open and saw pink. Encouraged, he uncowered enough to repeat, "I said, 'Beggin'YourMajesty's—"

"I caught _that_," Jareth snapped. "But what did you mean by it?"

Was it suddenly hotter in the room? Hoggle removed his hat, wiped his brow with it, then flapped it at the vanity overflowing with bottles and poufs, the wardrobe full of taffeta and tulle, and the monstrosity of a bed. "Well, Your Majesty, the ruffles, the powder, the dresses—and especially the pink—Sarah wouldn't like any of it."

Jareth's eyebrows raised. "None of it?"

"None of it."

"It seems I've got it all wrong then," Jareth murmured.

There was a wistfulness in his face as he took in the room again; Hoggle noted the way Jareth's eyes lingered on the dresses in the wardrobe in particular. It was a moment Hoggle himself had experienced not so long ago.

"She ain't a little girl any more, Your Majesty," he said softly.

The wistfulness instantly disappeared, so thoroughly replaced by Jareth's usual iciness that Hoggle almost wondered if he had seen it at all.

"Of course, Miss Williams is an adult now," Jareth snapped. "This room needs to be redone, obviously, and this time, you, Hoggle, with your vast depths of unplumbed knowledge, will act as my advisor."

"Me, Your Majesty? Your advisor?" Hoggle was stunned.

Jareth arched an eyebrow. "I can think of no one better or so well-informed to be my expert on Sarah's tastes, can you? Or should I summon Sir Di—?"

"No, Your Highness! You want to know what Sarah likes," Hoggle jerked a thumb at his chest, "I'm your man. I know everything, or everything that's worth knowin'."

The eyebrow lowered. "Excellent. Now tell me."

Hoggle blinked. "Tell you what?"

Jareth blinked back. "What you know, of course. Unless you can't remember. In that case, I can call—"

"She likes her cat," Hoggle said hastily (which might've been a lie—he had never been good at on-the-spot thinking). "She likes sleeping in, rainy days, long walks, checking this thing she calls 'eeemail.’ And 'traveling.’ She's always talking about needing a 'vacation' and 'traveling.’"

Jareth was pacing again. "Cats, sleeping in, rainy days, long walks, eeemail and traveling... What else?"

"Tea. She's awfully fond of the stuff. That, and books. She likes books."

"Yes," Jareth said, almost to himself. "I remember that last one. Anything else?"

Hoggle thought about mentioning Henry, Sarah's ex-boyfriend (she still liked him, didn't she?), but thought better of it. Jareth probably didn't want to know about that. "No, nuthin' else."

After that, the room fell silent. For a long while, there was only the soft crunch of Jareth's boots trampling wool flowers while he stewed and paced and made the appropriate alterations to his cunning plan. Hoggle, at a loss for what an advisor was supposed to do after he advised, wondered if Jareth would notice if he slipped from the room. Maybe there'd be time to get some groveling in before Sarah found out. As if dared, his shoes began inching toward the door.

"Hoggle!" Jareth had stopped pacing.

"Um, er, ah, yes?" Hoggle stuttered, tripping. "I weren't plannin' on going nowhere. Just now."

The seldom-used smile was back again, and this time, Hoggle merely cringed.

“Of course you weren't," Jareth said. "And if my plan works, neither will Sarah."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This author replies to comments unless on hiatus.


	2. A Really Bad Morning

With the desperate optimism of someone determined to make it in the big city, dammit, Sarah knew her morning could get better. Just knew it.

Though it may have started out with the heart-stopping panic of waking up twenty minutes late, it was still salvageable. She hadn't gotten her assistant editor's job at an independent food magazine for nothing. Sarah knew deadlines the way Bo used to know baseball. She was going to push her hair out of her face, rub the sleep from her eyes until they were clear enough to see how depressingly small her bedroom was, subtract the current time from the time she needed to be walking out of her apartment, figure out what part of her morning routine she could fit in the difference of that time, throw back the duvet, swing her legs out of bed...

...And put her left foot in cat vomit. Correction: _still-warm_ cat vomit.

One-footed, Sarah hopped out of her bedroom and into the hall with her mouth set in a tight, grim line. She could still save her morning. However, on her way toward the bathroom, it occurred to her to wonder how it was possible to have undigested kibble between her toes when she had given the stupid cat to the retired couple two floors down last week. No sooner had she finished her thought when she spied a giant ball of marmalade fur washing itself at the end of the hall, looking quite pleased with itself and quite at home.

"Don't get too comfortable, Gaspard!" Sarah yelled at it, half-in, half-out of the bathroom. "I don't know how you got in, but you're going right back out when I get off work. Understand that? Right back out!" She made a mental note to check the window by the fire escape when she got home.

Her shower was quick, but since there was no time to do her hair Sarah settled for a quick blowdry and a hair clip. Back in her room, she pulled on a black sweater, black trousers, painfully stylish black heels, and wiped up the cat vomit as best as she could. She looked at the alarm clock—only ten minutes late now; she could shampoo her carpet after work, after she took Gaspard back to the Goldsteins. 

She collected her purse (_check!_), her cell phone (_check!_), fastened on the watch that said on the back: "Congrats on your promotion, Dad and Irene" (_check!_), and after doing the usual once-over at herself in the full length mirror by her front door (_check!_), Sarah, armed once again with the optimism she'd dropped in her bedroom, sailed out of her apartment and onto the streets of New York.

However, she was ready to drop it again after the fourth cab she'd hailed passed her by. As she whistled and waved at the curb, several more went whizzing by, then several more, all with their lights on. 

Her morning had to get better. Just _had_ to! Sarah looked at her watch, frustrated, and started off at a brisk clip down the sidewalk. It was 7:50. She had ten minutes to make the five-block commute. She'd have to skip Starbucks, but she could do this, dammit.

By the end of the first block, Sarah began to regret her choice of shoes. At block three, when she stopped to rub her mangled toes for the umpteenth time, she felt a large, wet drop hit her forehead. She touched it, expecting to find a white glob, but then another drop hit her. And then another. And another. Under the stylishly and extremely painful narrow tips of her shoes, the sidewalk was rapidly dotting up with rain.

"Ah, great," Sarah groaned, blinking up at the sky. Huge clouds had rolled in from nowhere and now seemed to be homesteading above her head. “Great. That's just great." 

All around her pedestrians were snapping open umbrellas or ducking under store awnings. Sarah looked on in jealousy. "It's not fucking fair," she muttered under her breath. But she only had two blocks to go. She was so close to doing it, dammit, that she set her chin, shoved her shoe back on and limped for it.

By the time Sarah finally made it through the lobby and into the elevator of her building, it was 8:07. But she was there, she'd done it, and surely this was the part where her morning got better. As she got out of the elevator, she asked herself where _else_ could her shitty morning go but up?

But when Sarah opened the door to the small office of _The Troubled Fork_, Francesca, the receptionist, told her she was late, and that she looked like crap. As she passed by the photocopier, an intern called her "Mrs. Williams" and told her her nose was red. On the way to her cubicle, Herman, a divorced features writer, stared at the way her wet sweater hugged her nipples and told her there was a staff meeting at 8:30. When she finally sat down at her computer and brought it out of sleep mode, an e-mail from her ex-boyfriend Henry told her he had met The One.

Sarah was soaked. Her underwear had bunched in inappropriate places. Her hair was dripping into her eyes. There was a cramp in her side, a blister on the ball of her right foot, she was late to work and now she wasn't The One. 

She no longer believed her morning could get better. She was ready to crawl under her desk and cry.

Her computer chimed. A new e-mail appeared in her inbox, bolded subject line: _**Travel Opportunity! Escape Awaits You!**_

Even a blind man would've known it was junk mail, and on a normal day Sarah would have called the sender a nasty name and deleted it. But today she wanted an escape. Today her girl-in-the-big-city optimism had failed her, dammit, and she wanted to see pretty photos of white sand and snow-capped mountains and sunny skies—or whatever the hell it was trying to peddle. She still had fifteen minutes until her meeting. Sarah reached for her mouse and clicked on it.

But there weren't any pretty photos. There was only a blinking green italicized text on a white background. "Terrific!" Sarah said. She leaned over the mess of scattered layout proofs and Post-It notes on her desk and grabbed for a tissue as she read the words: _Tired? Stressed? Unhappy? _

Tired, stressed, unhappy _and_ disappointed, Sarah sniffled and said, "Why, yes. How did you know?" She dabbed at her wet face with the tissue and scrolled down.

_Want to get away from it all? Wish you could escape Underground? _it asked

"Oh god, yes, I'd _love_ to escape," Sarah answered. She tossed the soggy tissue in the waste bin under her desk and looked at the clock. Ten minutes to dry off in the bathroom and prepare for a meeting that would probably last all morning. Sarah sniffled again as she peeled the fabric of her sweater away from her skin. "In fact, I wish I could escape right now."

_Then it's your lucky day_, the screen flashed.

And in the next moment, the world—as they say—fell down.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This author replies to comments unless on hiatus.


	3. A Long Conversation

Once over Spring Break during her sophomore year of college, Sarah and a few of her friends drove to Maryland to spend a week near the ocean. There had been an amusement park close to the house they were renting, big enough to spend the day at, but small enough for the lines to be short. The popcorn was good, the lemonade sour, and the roller coasters forgettable, but there was one ride Sarah remembered very clearly—a thrill ride boasting a 20-story free fall drop.

While what she was currently experiencing wasn't nearly as intense as "The Free-For-(F)all™," the same feeling that she was going to piss her shorts was there—only, this time it was paired with the just-as-frightening (if not more so) sensation of the world completely disappearing. The fluorescent lighting and the neutral gray carpeting, the cubicles with their greige tackboard fabric, her messy desk with its box of “Assistant Editor: Sarah Williams” business cards... _Poof! Gone!_ Vanished into the darkness while Sarah fell and fell.

Somehow in the midst of her panic, a dusty, girlish memory floated to the surface—and though it had been buried beneath fourteen years of dogged pragmatism, Sarah knew it was real, like a Hoggle and Ludo and Didymus real. She had fallen through a void like this before.

She squeezed her eyelids shut and counted to three before opening them again, half expecting, half hoping for disembodied hands to appear all around her, helping her, slowing her fall. And when there weren’t any, terror, more real than a Hoggle and Ludo and Didymus real, set in. She opened her mouth to scream either until somebody heard her, until one of her lungs collapsed or until her poor heart stopped in fright—

But was cruelly and unexpectedly interrupted by the arrival of the floor and its friend, pain.

It shot from the boniest parts of her butt clear up to her teeth, where it left her mouth as a long, sharp hiss. All Sarah could do was clench every muscle in her body while she waited for her brain to take stock of the damage and give the all clear.

_It could've been worse,_ it told her, told everyone, as Sarah slowly uncoiled. _It could've been a five-digit hospital bill of worse._ Her lower back agreed. As the pain receded, Sarah gingerly tested out the rest of her parts, then let out a tentative laugh of relief. Yes, it could've been worse.

Then the lights came up and Sarah saw where she had landed. The room was bigger than her whole apartment, with light colored walls, tall windows and dark wood floors. An empty, but stately fireplace with books lining its mantelpiece sat on one side of her—and on the other, a pair of angled matching ivory wingback chairs and a small, round antique table between them. It was an open and honest room, certainly not the kind of place Sarah would've expected to fall into, but exactly the kind of place she would've sold a kidney for.

Yes, it most definitely could've been worse.

Then someone—someone not affiliated with her body—said: "Hello, Sarah."

Then she saw who it was.

Then she said: "Fuck."

Then everyone, including her offended kidney, agreed it was now worse.

Though the hair was still unmistakably him, the rest of his appearance was a little more restrained—a little less Elton, a little more Austen with his gray breeches (_breeches!_), plain black shirt and shiny riding boots. He sat in one of the chairs (though she could've sworn he hadn't been a second ago), ankle over knee, hands folded in his lap, and a benign smile in place like he was hosting a goddamned book club instead of watching women bounce off the floor. It made Sarah feel like some trick was being pulled.

Warning bells of all kinds and shapes went off in her head. _Wait_—some trick _had _been pulled! Why else would she be here and sore instead of in her office chair and soggy? 

Sarah summoned up all the mean-spiritedness she'd shored up from living three years in New York, made a dart of her finger, and roared, "_You!"_

Jareth’s smile grew. "Oh good. So you remember me after all.”

But three years of big city spite and one crappy morning had taken their toll, and Sarah was in no mood to be civil. "I should've known _you_ were the one behind all this!” she flung at him. Her finger stayed trained on Jareth's face like a gun as she scuttled backward and into the empty chair across from him. “Like, why else would I just up and fall through my office floor? Well, _I _wouldn't, because I don't have that kind of power—nor do I much relish falling through my office floor, by the way—it _hurt, _dammit! But because some Goblin King tyrant decided he wanted to, what, avenge a fourteen-year-old grudge, _here I friggin' am!_"

The book club smile faded. "'Gobin King tyrant?’" Jareth repeated. "'Fourteen-year-old grudge?’ Sarah, is that why you think you're down here?"

"Gee, what part gave it away?"

Jareth tipped his head back and laughed. "Sarah, dear," he said, eyes crinkling appreciatively, "do you realize how cold it's been down here without you and your spirit, your fire...your _you_?"

"I don't care," Sarah told him. "And quit laughing at me, asshole. Answer the question. If I'm not down here for that then what in the hell am I doing here?"

Then a dreadful thought overtook her; Sarah gasped and put both hands to her mouth in horror. "Oh my god, wait! Is it about Hoggle? Did something bad happen?" When Jareth shook his head, she asked, "Ludo? Didymus?"

"No and no," he answered. "While your concern is touching, your friends are hardly in need of it."

"Then look, I don't know what kind of game you're playing at here, but—"

Jareth cut her off with a sound of offense. "'Game,’ Sarah? Really now, why do you automatically assume my intentions and motives are so wicked and dishonorable?"

"I don't know," said Sarah hotly. "_Are_ they? I mean, what could you possibly want from me so badly that you would resort to kidnapping me with spam? _Spam!_ Wait, don't tell me you were responsible for the other stuff too—the alarm clock, the cat, the cabs, the rain, the meeting...?"

"Guilty," he said, looking quite pleased with himself. "Except for the meeting. I had nothing to do with that."

"Why, you little—!"

"A visit," Jareth quickly put in. "Fifteen minutes of your time, Sarah—nothing more. No games, no revenge, no trickery. Just a chance to get acquainted with this new, adult you."

Sarah made a show of checking her watch. "Can't. Really important meeting in ten minutes—_you know, _the one you had nothing to do with. So if you could just send me back..."

"Ah, but time isn't measured the same here," Jareth reassured her. "There's no hurry if that's what worries you."

The dart gun of her index finger made a swift reappearance. "_You_ worry me,” Sarah said, aiming it at his nose. "So send me back now, _please_—see, I'm asking politely—before I get really nasty, or worse, fired. Because I will, I'll rip into you good. If you thought before was bad..."

"Speaking of nasty," Jareth said, picking a bit of lint from his pants. "Take a look at yourself." An ornate, silver hand mirror appeared on the round table between the chairs. "Prudence, Sarah. Are you sure you wish me to send you back like that? Wouldn't you rather have a towel first?" A plush white towel joined the mirror. "A chance to dry your clothes?" He snapped his fingers and the fireplace roared to life. "A cup of tea?"

Sarah's promised nastiness wavered a little. "Tea? You have tea?" she asked, hopeful, before recalling why she no longer ate peaches. She skewered Jareth with a look. "Oh, nice try. Really, how stupid do you think I am?"

One of his eyebrows arched. "Pardon?"

"The last time I was down here, I ate something that messed me up big time—you know this—and if you think I'm going to fall for that again..."

"Ah, yes. _That_," Jareth said, smiling at the memory. "As you'll recall, Sarah, we _were_ in a contest at the time, and I'm sure you've heard the saying, 'All's fair in love and war.'"

"You _poisoned_ me! You put something in that peach—you can't deny it!"

"Don't be so melodramatic, Sarah," Jareth snapped. "It was hardly poison and not at all dangerous."

"The hell it wasn't!" Sarah retorted. "I could've—could've—!"

Jareth's eyes flashed. "Could've what, Sarah? Danced until morning? Stayed down here with your brother and your friends and lived a life less ordinary? Is your life now so remarkable that what I offered was such a sentence?" When she didn't answer, he continued, "You have my word, there will be nothing in your cup other than tea and good intentions. I said no games or trickery and you may trust me to honor that. Stay. Please." He then rose from his chair as if it were decided.

Another small round table appeared in front of the fireplace, in the place where she had landed only a few angry moments ago. On it, Sarah saw an elegant white tea service in the Tiffany basketweave pattern, exactly like the set she would've registered for had Henry proposed. When a tiered plate with white-frosted petit fours materialized next to the teapot, Sarah whimpered. Nothing about her morning was coincidence any more, was it? The cynic in her immediately bristled.

"Fine," she said ungraciously, but inside, she was eyeing the teapot, the cakes, the china wistfully. "One cup—neat—that's it. Then you send me back. Deal?"

To Jareth's credit, he didn't gloat. Face appropriately neutral, he asked, "And would you care for a piece of cake?"

Sarah snorted. "Is the Pope Catholic?"

He paused with his hand over a petit four. "I'm afraid I don't see—"

"Never mind," Sarah said. "Cake, yes."

As she was staying for tea (and now cake), Sarah decided she might as well take advantage of the mirror and towel—especially since, after seeing her reflection, she had to concede that "nasty" was indeed right. When her hair was combed out and clipped up again, her clothes patted dry and her makeup less smeared, Sarah pulled her chair closer to the fire and eased her feet out of her infernal shoes. When she accepted the cup, saucer and plate of cake from Jareth, her smile was only a little forced.

Her plan had been to drink the tea as quickly as she could without burning her tongue, inhale the cake down as well as her esophagus would let her, and leave as soon as her stomach had caught up. But when Sarah sniffed the steam above her cup she knew that wasn't going to work. She took a small sip, then another. The tea tasted delicious and new, like leaves and blooms and bees. The cake—Sarah's eyelids fluttered—was something she'd sacrifice a body part for. Even her kidney agreed.

"How is the tea? Tolerable?"

Sarah nearly choked. To her shame, caught up in the ecstasy of her full mouth, she had forgotten where she was, who she was with. He was sitting in the book club host pose again with his own cup in hand, his expression decidedly more than that of just casual interest.

"Mmm!" she managed, blushing.

"Excellent. And the cake?"

"Mmm!"

"Another triumph," he declared.

While her mouth worked on her last bite of cake, Sarah's eyes skittered away from Jareth and settled on the books on the mantel. Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde, Louisa May Alcott... She looked away from the books to the windows with their filmy, fluttery curtains to the table between them with its Regency-style footings. Were these his books, his décor, his tastes? Or were they just more convenient coincidences? She slowly licked the frosting from her fingers, considering, then set her empty cup and plate on the table next to the mirror and asked, "So...do you, um, live here?"

Jareth took a deep draught of tea and set his cup on the floor. "Well, that depends."

"On what?"

His long, elegant fingers steepled. "What you call living, I imagine. I eat here. I sleep here. I breathe here. I have, ah, people around, but well..." Jareth shrugged.

"I get it," Sarah said, nodding. "That's why you've been so insistent on this"—she made quotation marks with her fingers—"'Fifteen minutes of your time, Sarah.' Because you're lonely. I get it. Believe me, living in New York, as big as it is... It's not so hard to understand."

Jareth made a noise that sounded like a cross between a scoff and laugh. "You think you know me, do you? I'm curious, Sarah—why is it so hard to accept that you're down here simply because I wanted the pleasure of seeing you again?"

Sarah rolled her eyes. "Because why would you? I'm nobody important."

"Nobody important? Sarah, you are, quite possibly, my favorite thing to think about."

Sarah blushed and looked away to the hem of her sweater, as his admission, so intense and so personal, made her thoughts unwillingly rewind back to Henry's e-mail. She'd experienced the heady thrill of being someone's favorite thing once, six months ago. Now she was simply an address in an email "To:" line. 

"Give it time," she mumbled, blinking at her lap.

"I'd be delighted to," Jareth said. He sat up. "As you'll recall, the purpose of this visit was to get acquainted with this new you."

"But there's nothing to get acquainted with," Sarah insisted. She sighed up at the ceiling, then met Jareth's odd, interested eyes and said as candidly as she could, "I'm an assistant editor who also, depressingly, turns thirty next year. Most of my salary goes toward the ridiculously high rent for what's practically a closet, the rest toward tea, cab fare, Indian take-out, and clothes I really can't afford. I hate my cat, I hate getting stuck in the rain, I hate oversleeping—and above all, I hate wanting things I know I'll never be able to have. So there you have it: I'm boring and bitter and bitchy, and not someone that someone like"—Sarah gestured to his clothes and hair_—_"_you_ would—_should_—find interesting." She picked at a stray thread at her hem. "Not when you're so obviously—"

"Just a man," Jareth finished. When Sarah only stared at him, he sat back in his chair and amended, "Very well, an extraordinary and dashing man."

"And humble," Sarah added.

Jareth smiled. "Terribly. But come now, Sarah, you've left out what no one else Above can claim, what makes you more than just a boring and bitter assistant editor. You may have forgotten—or tried to forget—but I haven't."

Sarah's mouth hardened. "I thought this wasn't about revenge, Jareth."

"And it isn't," he said. "I told you it wasn't and I meant it."

"Look, I should be going. You asked for fifteen minutes and, well...now I have a meeting to get to." Sarah slipped her feet back into her shoes and made to stand, relieved that her bruises decided not to protest. "How do I get back?"

"Simply wish for it," Jareth said. His fingers were steepled again. "You'll be right back where you left."

Wish herself back. Of course. Sarah could've kicked herself for not thinking of it sooner. She took one last look around at what she knew was the closest she'd come to her dream place. Her eyes lingered longingly over the hissing and crackling fire, the spines of unexplored books, the comfortable chairs, the coveted tea set and the still-full stand of cakes. She mentally compared it to her office—the recycled air, the unpredictable photocopier, the maze of cubicles, the gossipy coworkers, the neutral gray impersonalness of it all. 

A sigh came up all the way from her mangled toes. "God, I wish I didn't have to..."

"Yes?"

Horrified by what she'd almost done, Sarah's eyes snapped to Jareth’s in alarm, and for a very brief moment, a nano-second moment, a gasp moment, she caught a crack in the insouciance and saw clear through to what lay beneath. Loneliness, expected, but also a raw yearning, despairing and ages old. She'd seen it once before, though she'd been too young to understand it and the many ways a heart could break. Now she knew and now she knew why she was there. 

And suddenly it was all too much.

She was light-headed as she held out her hand. "Good-bye, Jareth. All things considered, this went swimmingly, I think. Same time, next year?" Her laugh was tremulous, strained.

The mask was back in place. Jareth stood and pressed a light, lingering kiss on her knuckles. "Farewell, Sarah. It truly was a pleasure."

"All right, here goes," she said, slipping her hand from his and looking at the ceiling. "I wish..."

Her wish was a simple one, with a footnote about a cancelled meeting and a healed backside. Then she met Jareth's eyes as he stared across at her. _I'm sorry_, Sarah wanted to say, _for everything_, but she held her tongue. And just before the room became drowned in a shower of lights, she saw him sigh.

* * *

Jareth waited until the glitter motes faded then he snapped his fingers. The white walls became pink again, the tea and books disappeared, and what had once been a blazing fireplace was now a door, which Jareth opened and strode through, in search of his new advisor.

"Same time, next year, Sarah?" he murmured to himself. "If you really think it'll take that long..."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This author replies to comments unless on hiatus.


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